September 21 Green Energy News…

Every General Motors manufacturing plant in Ohio and Indiana will now be completely powered by wind energy thanks to a 200-MW power purchase agreement. The automaker is now the sole user of the 100-MW Northwest Ohio Wind Farm, and another 100 MW will come from the HillTopper Wind Project in Illinois. [Power Engineering Magazine]

Wind farm

Reports from Nicaragua say that President Daniel Ortega has confirmed his country will finally sign the Paris Climate Agreement. This means the US and Syria would be the only two countries in the world that are not active parties to it. The Nicaraguan position had been that the Paris Climate Agreement it did not go far enough. [CleanTechnica]

The US Climate Alliance, a coalition of states backing the Paris Climate Accord, announced that North Carolina had joined in defiance of President Trump’s decision to exit the United Nations pact. Washington Gov Jay Inslee said, “If we were a country, we would be the third-largest economy of any nation in the world.” [Washington Examiner]

A survey conducted by the European Commission in March found that 92% of European Union citizens consider climate change a serious problem, with 74% calling it “very serious.” An impressive 89% of Europeans believe that it is important for their own national government to set targets to increase renewable energy use by 2030. [CleanTechnica]

Hurricane Maria knocked out power across the island of Puerto Rico, home to 3.5 million people, officials have said. The head of the disaster management agency said none of the customers of Puerto Rico’s Electric Power Authority had power. The US National Hurricane Center said “catastrophic” flooding was sweeping parts of the island. [BBC]